Clothes-pin



M 3U @i c 4 n C e w w PATENT SARAH J. MILEY, OF MANCHESTER, NEWHAMPSHIRE.

CLOTHES-PIN.

SPECIFICATION forming part Of Letters Patent No. 622,380, dated April 4,1899. Application led February 14,1898. lSerial No. 670,164. (No model.)

To all whom t may concern:

Be it known that I, SARAH J. MILEY, a citizen of the United States,residing at Manchester, in the county of Hillsborough and State of NewHampshire, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Clothes-Pins; and I do hereby declare the following to be a full, clear, andexact description of the invention, such as will enable others skilledin the art to which it appertains to make and use the same.

This invention has forits object a general improvement of the ordinaryclothes pin when made of a single piece of wood, which frequently gives'much trouble and annoyance by failing to hold a garment upon a line.Such a pin may be forced very tightly onto a garment and line; but ifthe wind is blowing strong the garment strains the pin so severely thatit often slips off, letting the vgarment fall to the ground. Then,again, when the pin grips the garment sufficiently tight to withstandthe strain caused by a strong wind the pin is liable to split, thusrendering it useless.

The object of my invention is to overcome these difficulties byimproving the efficiency of the ordi-nary style of clothes-pin; and tothis end my invention consists of a clothespin made of a single piece ofbifurcated wood of the same form as is the common pin, having theadjacent sides of its split or bifurcated portion corrugated andprovided with curved strengthening or stay plates, and having prongsprojecting at right angles from its edges for driving into the pin atopposite terminals of the slit or bifurcation, as fully set forth in thefollowing specification and claims and clearly illustrated in thedrawings accompanying and forming a part of the same, of which- Figure lis an elevation of my improved bifurcated clothes-pin, Fig. 2 being asectional elevation of the same. Fig. 3 is a crosssection taken on lineX X of Fig. l. is an enlarged perspective view of one of my improvedstay-plates which prevent the clothes-pin from splitting. Fig. 5 is anenlarged elevation showing a simple modification of my improvedstayplates.

Similar reference-letters designate correspending parts throughout theseveral views.

The clothes=pin A is bifurcated at B; but

Fig. 4. v

to carry out my invention this slit B is made with a corrugated cutter,which forms line ridges or corrugations upon the adjacent sides of theslit, as at b in the drawings, rendering the pin certain to hold agarment to a line if properly applied, and to prevent the clothespinfromV splitting when excessively strained I provide a pair of metalplates C, curved to correspond with the diameter of a clothespin andhaving two or more prongs c for driving into the wood, as seen in F-igs.2 and 3, and these prongs c may be flat and ser rated, as at cin Fig. 4,or they may be formed of threaded wire, as in Fig. 5, the purpose ofthese serrated or threaded prongs being to firmly and securely hold theplates C upon the clothes-pin.

It is a matter of common knowledge that the grain of the wood ofclothes-pins extends longitudinally, or practically so, and while theinteriitt-ing corrugations serve to fasten the clothes more securelyupon the line the pin would be liable to split along the grain above theend of the .bifurcation were it not for the stay-plates described. Forthis reason the terminal prongs of the plates are disposed with thegrain, serving to bind the wood fiber and prevent its spreadinglaterally or splitting, while the intermediate prong is disposed acrossthe grain, in line with the bifurcation, to sever the fiber and preventthe split from extending above the stay-plate in the event of the pinbeing subjected to sufficient strain to start the split.

It should be noted that no special adaptation of the pin for thereception of the plates is necessary and that the plates constructed asdescribed may be quickly applied to any pin of ordinary construction.

A practical test of my improved clothes-pin satisfies me that it can berelied upon to hold a garment upon a line Where the ordinary pin willwork o, allowing the garment to drop.

Having described myimprovements, what I claim is=t l. As a new articleof manufacture a wooden clothes-pin provided with a longitudinal slit,and diametrically-opposed stay-plates located above the slit andprovided respectively with terminal prongs extending into the pin aboveand at opposite sides of the slit and disposed with the grain and anintermediate prong di- IOO - rectly above the slit and disposed acrossthe pin, and an intermediate prong above the ter;

grain, substantially as specied. minal prongs, directly above the slitand dis- 2. As a new article of manufacture a wooden posed across thegrain, substantially as speciclothes-pin provided with a tortuous slitformlied. v 5 ing intertting corrugations, diametrically In testimonywhereof I aflix my signature I5 opposite stay-plates located above theslit and in presence of two witnesses.

of substantially triangular form and provided SARAH J. MILEY.respectively with terminal prongs extending Witnesses: from the plateabove and at opposite sides of J. Il. THURSTON,

Io the slit and disposed with the grain of the l). II. SULLIVAN.

